"And like all the best prayers, it's most effective when it comes unbidden at moment of great need," he replied. It didn't bother him that she'd been watching. It was, to an outside observer, remarkably boring work.
"Do you find comfort in the repetition?" she asked. It was something they tried to teach the Rangers in their training, something their Human recruits always seemed to find difficult at first.
"It's not what I'm looking for." The repetitions were a means to an end. If he found any comfort, it came from paying attention to the smallest detail of each attempt and making corrections. The devil, and often the outcome, was in the details.
Bond had that look of pained confusion that often came with being beowulfed. "It hadn't crossed my mind," he said, remembering that he had to resist the temptation to yell back. "You'll be happy to know that I wasn't thinking about you at all."
"Neither have I," he said, finally giving in and taking a step back. "However, hypothermia has never been my idea of a good time." Hadn't there been monsters involved in this challenge? "It would make fighting any monsters that might crop up even more difficult."
That was probably the wrong thing to say, wasn't it? The Great Geat enjoyed a challenge.
He looked surprised at being confronted by a talking dog, but said nothing about it as he picked up the pencil. "I don't think a pencil is a suitable playtoy," James said instead. "If if broke, the pieces might be dangerous."
There was something in the studied repetitiveness of Bond's magic work that had caught Brienne's attention. She stood in the doorway, watching him for a moment without speaking. She did understand the gist of what he was going for, that need to have the spell be as much reflex as forethought. It was something all warriors tried to do, in their way, she supposed. And his magical practice was a reminder that her own spellwork was not as good as it could be.
She stepped into the room, not being particularly silent about it so he'd know she was there. "Do you mind some company?" she asked, producing her own wand. "I could do with a bit of practice myself."
"As long as you aren't expecting something more than a flying pencil, no," he told her. Bond regarded Brienne in her own right. Her broad shoulders and strong frame suggested that she was someone like him, who would be prepared for a fight when it was coming.
"I'm not worried about distraction." The man could have a bomb go off behind him, and he'd still be practicing the swish and flick if that was what he needed to be doing. "If it's a concern for you, then I can move to this corner, and you can take that one."
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"You go at that spell as if it were prayer," she said at a point where the pencil was stationary.
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That was probably the wrong thing to say, wasn't it? The Great Geat enjoyed a challenge.
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She stepped into the room, not being particularly silent about it so he'd know she was there. "Do you mind some company?" she asked, producing her own wand. "I could do with a bit of practice myself."
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"How do we do this?" she asked once she'd produced it. "The idea probably isn't to distract each other, at least at first."
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